


Malleable

by OfDvorakAndDastardlySchemes



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: #JustFuckMeUp Fest, Biting, Established Relationship, Fluff and Smut, Light Bondage, M/M, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Season/Series 01, Universe Alterations, if that's a thing I will die of laughter, no encephalitis, or light encephalitis, probably far too much talking for a PWP, self-restraint
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-27
Updated: 2017-06-27
Packaged: 2018-11-19 10:53:13
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,941
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11311899
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OfDvorakAndDastardlySchemes/pseuds/OfDvorakAndDastardlySchemes
Summary: "Hush, Will.  Hush, my dear boy."  Hannibal's hands slid to his jaw and the curve at the base of his skull, holding him there, holding him steady, holding him present."Huh... ha... haaa."  Will breathed in large open-mouthed puffs of air; it was the only way he could keep his lungs, and his mind, from collapsing.  Hannibal's hands were large, gripping tight, molding Will in the shape he wanted.  It helped.  The vacuum eased a little."Deep breaths, Will.  You can do this for me."  When Will's breathing had deepened sufficiently, Hannibal's thumb rasped across his chin, just shy of his lower lip, and then the hand at his jaw was gone, skimming fingertips down his chest, then his stomach, so Will knew where it was going.---------------Will has trouble keeping his head in the moment.  There's a kink for that.





	Malleable

**Author's Note:**

> Just a bit of kinky S1 established-relationship fluff! My first JustFuckMeUp submission and my first smut!

The arrangement had been for Will to be at Hannibal's house at 7:30.  It was 11:47 when he opened the door.

He tried his best to stamp the street sludge (not quite snow) off his shoes before he pulled himself inside, feeling a little unsettled for letting himself in.  The door had been unlocked, but it still felt like a violation without Hannibal to allow him, to oversee his entry.  He tried not to let the solid, lavish door thump when he shut it.

It was possible his dysphoria was due to the new case Jack had dragged to his doorstep at 3:15, just as he was getting ready to leave.

A home invasion in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.  The family had been killed, and one body had been partially mutilated, but it seemed the killer had been interrupted.  The scene was unremarkable and had been trampled by the Lancaster police, but it showed possible connections to another two in North Carolina and Maine, four and seven weeks ago.  Or, at least, that's what Jack fervently believed, and had corralled Will into a brightly-lit FBI conference room with an abundance of pictures and more noise.

He had only managed time to slip away for two minutes to try to call and explain that he'd be late.  Hannibal hadn't answered the phone; Will left a harried, apologetic message.  When he finally managed to convince Jack that he'd be no further help tonight, his phone had died in his pocket.  It had occurred to him as he was driving to Hannibal's house that he could stop, make a slight detour and find a pay phone, but he didn't, for the same reason he didn't hang his coat up properly on Hannibal's immaculate wall: he was tired.  Bone tired, in the way that sets its icy ache into your marrow, but not your skin; your skull, but not your mind.

He supposed, in that case, he shouldn't have come at all, should have driven back to Wolf Trap and slept it off, called Hannibal in the morning to apologize and reschedule.  But this was hardly the first time Jack's killers had interrupted their plans, and Hannibal had made a point of showing he always wanted Will around, no matter how bad company he was going to be.  It would hardly be the first time he'd spent the night, either, though usually those had sex involved.  It would probably offend Hannibal's sensibilities not to let him crash here, but Will suspected that was not the direction either of them had envisioned the evening taking.  Perhaps he shouldn't have come. 

Too late now.  While Will's wound-up brain had been tearing into itself, his feet had taken him through Hannibal's house, to the corridor outside the kitchen.  The rest of the house (he vaguely recalled) was in varying states of darkened dormancy, but the box of light in the doorway was hardly diminished.  The surrounding gloom only made it brighter, more active.

_ Three victims stabbed, one shot.  Kitchen.  Midnight snack. _  He shook his head vigorously.

Hannibal would know he'd been here, by the melted slush in the foyer or the smell of aftershave and dog hair in the halls, probably.  He took the last few steps and poked his head in the door.  "Hannibal?"

Hannibal had been polishing knives at the island, it seemed, and his head rose abruptly from his task at the sound.  "Will."

It was as close to jumping as Hannibal ever got.  Perhaps he'd become absorbed in his task, fallen into a sort of muscular reverie.  Perhaps Will didn't reek as badly as he'd thought.  Perhaps his feet had taken on some of the killer, muffling their own sound in the barely-carpeted corridor without his knowledge.

While Will was corralling these feral thoughts, Hannibal had put down the knife and the cloth, and moved halfway around the island.  "I thought Jack would have kept you much longer, or not at all."

Will tried to hide his startle at being pulled back to reality, with very little idea whether he'd succeeded or not.  Hannibal's mildly curious expression didn't alter.  "No actual scenes on this one, just pictures.  Even Jack knows I can't do much with that."  Will rubbed at the base of his skull, where it ached.  The worst that could do was look sheepish.

"But you can try, and that's what's important to Jack," Hannibal mused, a little less than an arm's length in front of Will.

"Right," said Will, who couldn't quite summon the fortitude to keep his eyes on Hannibal's face.  They lingered on his fitted pinstripe shirt, instead, and Will wished his head wasn't so full of number markers and spattered wallpaper, so he could really take in the way Hannibal's shoulders filled out the fabric, the way it worked to accommodate his compact musculature.

"Please, take a seat, Will," Hannibal said, stepping back, and Will felt seen.  He glanced at Hannibal's face as he passed, and there was a knowing cast to his eye that made Will certain the game was up.

Instead of saying anything, however, Hannibal moved back behind the island, putting away the knives meticulously while he announced, "I'd put dinner away before you came over.  Fortunately, it keeps quite well.  Would you care for some?"

Will's stomach lurched.  "No, thank you.  I don't think I can eat right now.  I'm sorry, I might not be very good company tonight."  He began tapping his jittery fingers against the countertop, as quietly as he could.

"Don't be sorry."  Hannibal inclined his head to the left, studying Will inquisitively, and asked, "Would you like to tell me about the case?"

_ 'Like to _ ,' Will thought bitterly, but he said anyway, "Families.  Usually four or five, no only children so far, edges of cities, not quite suburban.  The homes are broken into, the families are killed, the bodies are mutilated in some way or another.  The killer-- or killers, really, there's not much linking the scenes except the force of Jack's willpower-- the last scene was interrupted halfway, he only got partway into slicing the husband open.  There's nothing particularly telling about the way the corpses are altered."

And apparently, no amount of forced locks or shattered vases were enough to keep Will from admiring the way Hannibal's shoulders rose and flexed when he splayed his hands on the countertop and leaned forward on them.

He kept his eyes on those, let them run the length of Hannibal’s arms to see the outstanding tendons of his hands, while he went on.  “I don’t know what makes Jack feel they’re related.  I mean, I can ask, and he gives logical-- flimsy-- answers, but I don’t know what makes him  _ feel _ it.  And those are about the only feelings I have to go on.  The scenes-- they’re not particularly dispassionate, but they’re just  _ scenes _ to me so far, snapshots frozen in time after their climax and I can’t tell from what’s on the stage what the story is, how the rising action worked.  All I can do is fill my head with details of the stage as it’s been left and hope I’ll magically make something of it.  But nothing connects, nothing happens, and I’m just left with empty houses and cold bodies in my head.”  He dared a quick glance up, before returning to the shoulders.

Hannibal was looking at him inscrutably.  "Do you want my company tonight, Will?"

"Yes!" rushed Will.  "Yes.  I want to-- definitely.  I just, I'm having trouble  _ not  _ being in Birmingham or Lancaster right now."

Hannibal's look turned contemplative.  "Perhaps... There's something I had wanted to try with you.  Perhaps tonight would be a good opportunity.  It may help you keep your mind away from Jack's crime scenes and bring it forward to the space we occupy now."

Will's tongue went dry.  His gaze snapped quickly up, making eye contact for just a second.  He spent a moment unsticking his throat, and asked, "Do you mean...?"

The crinkles around Hannibal's eyes spoke of warmth.  "Let's go upstairs, Will."

Again, Will foundered for a fraction of a second, and then said, "Sure," ignoring the fact that his heartbeat had elevated just enough to be noticeable as he got to his feet and followed Hannibal's lead out of the kitchen.  Hannibal fell into position by Will’s side, one hand resting lightly between his shoulder blades, as they ascended the stairs and made the familiar journey to the master bedroom.  It felt oddly like being escorted.  Will found he didn’t really mind.  He started to ponder why that was, but then they were over the threshold of Hannibal’s bedroom and that fell several rungs of importance.

It was still new enough that this space still felt like Hannibal's territory, but Will wasn't so off-kilter that he couldn't turn around and drag Hannibal by the sides of his face into a deep, all-consuming kiss.  He could feel Hannibal's lips drawing into a brief flash of a smile before it disappeared and Hannibal was kissing back just as fervently, driving Will back further and further into the room with lips and hands and feet, keeping Will just a step from overbalancing until they were firmly ensconced in the dim space, an arm's length from the bedside. 

There Will made his stand.  He planted his feet and buried a hand in Hannibal's hair to re-angle the kiss on his terms, using the other to pull roughly on Hannibal's belt, jamming their hips together, which admittedly made him groan just as hard as Hannibal, but it still felt like a victory.

Hannibal let him have it, following Will's lead until he pulled reluctantly away, leaving Will panting.  "You should undress now," he said, and there was a low breathy quality to his voice that still shot a spark of  _ want  _ through Will every time.

Hannibal's fingers were prodding open his wrinkled jacket and undoing the buttons of his shirt.  "Right," said Will, and reached to unbutton Hannibal's own shirt, but his hands were knocked away and Hannibal made a soft "ah, ah" sound that shouldn't have sounded so damn alluring from a grown-ass man.

"What?" Will asked, looking up to see Hannibal looking at him with what looked like an odd mix of concern, amusement, and reproof.

"Kindly take off your glasses, Will."

"Oh.  Right."  Will quickly removed them with a sinking feeling, which only intensified when he realized his hands were shaking slightly.  He folded them and laid them aside on the desk a few paces behind him, and when he turned back Hannibal caught his mouth in a sweet, lingering kiss, one hand cupping the side of his face. 

Hannibal pulled away, just before lack of breath would have become pressing, with a suck to Will's lower lip that made a shiver perch at the top of his spine, threatening to run the length of  him.  "Relax, Will.  Everything is quite all right.”

Will let his eyelids hover where they had fallen, half-closed, for a moment, before lifting them so he could see what he was doing.  “Okay,” he said, so that he didn’t say ‘right’ for the third time in a row, and lifted his fingers again to the soft crisp sheen of Hannibal’s shirt placket.  Hannibal allowed it this time, making a soft hum barely more than a breath, and continued opening Will’s shirt, sliding a hand flat along the skin of Will’s chest as soon as he was able.

They continued undressing themselves and each other, exchanging kisses which started softly but which soon gained a distinct note of hunger.  Will dispensed of his own clothes roughly, but Hannibal made at least some effort to drape the ones he removed over the back of the nearby chair.  Will found himself gazing peripherally at it while Hannibal tried to toss the last of his clothing onto the pile without ceasing to touch him.

_ There were discarded clothes on the floor in Carolina-- abandoned in temporary haste, now left to lie there in permanence.  Artifacts of desire, abandoned to become pieces of background to a scene devoid of life. _

Hannibal delivered an unexpected bite to the ball of a shoulder.  Will jerked.

"Your mind is elsewhere, Will."

Will swallowed.  "I... Oh.  I'm sorry," he replied, leaving Birmingham as much as he could and feeling utterly wretched.

"No apology is necessary. That is why we are trying a new technique."  Hannibal pressed another kiss to his lips, brief and efficient but still slick and shuddery, and squeezed Will’s wrist before he stepped away.

“Stay there, please,” he said, and disappeared into a little door to the right of the antique wardrobe.  He returned seconds later with a steel-blue scarf, very drapey, lots of sheen.  Probably did very little against cold, but knowing Hannibal, that likely wasn’t the point.

"Perhaps if we require you to use a little of your focus here, you will find it easier not to focus on your crime scene," Hannibal explained, making no move to emphasize the length of silk in his hand.

"Well, I'll try anything," Will said, and hoped he didn't sound ungrateful.

"Hold your hands out behind your back, please."

Will did, bringing his wrists together behind him so they could be bound, though he still didn't see how this would require focus.  Hannibal, however, nudged them back apart to shoulder width, and uncurled Will's fingers so he could encourage them to close again around handfuls of the scarf.

"Do not let go of the scarf," Hannibal instructed, once he had tugged on the fabric to test Will’s grip and circled back to Will’s front, stepping back a few paces as though to assess Will with an artist’s eye for composition.

"All right," Will replied, beginning to see what Hannibal might have meant but still mostly befuddled.

Will could see that this was not entirely therapeutic, not just a means to an end.  Hannibal had something raw and hungry in his eyes, like a sculptor about to sink his chisel into the perfect block of stone.

It made Will want to look away.  It made him want to capture that look under glass, and keep it forever.  It made him want to kiss the breath out of Hannibal, remove its oxygen source, and see what it became.  

He did not have long to contemplate it; Hannibal exercised his unusual gift for absolute stillness only a few moments more, and then he was advancing on Will.  One hand settled on Will’s waist, as though about to lead him in a waltz; the other wrapped itself firmly around the side of his neck, using a thumb under his jaw to tip his head up into a voracious kiss.  The contrast of connotations made Will’s blood spark, and he pressed back into the kiss, seeking out the heat of Hannibal’s mouth with his tongue.  The slick richness there intoxicated Will, as it always did.  His hands came up to tug at Hannibal’s hair, to make him gasp and open his jaw that little bit more-- and jerked back, reproved, at the ends of their forgotten tether.

Will wrenched himself back in instinctual confusion, mouth leaving Hannibal’s with a wet  _ pop _ .  One moment he’d been kissing, and the next he was staring down at the end of a scarf clenched in his right fist.

Hannibal looked just as surprised, though he blinked away the wild light in his eyes and composed himself with two jagged breaths.

"I take it, then, that you hadn't noticed quite how handsy you are during sex," Hannibal commented in a tone of amusement, as collected as though he’d been discussing obsessive personality types.

Will gaped at him, still discombobulated and getting the distinct feeling that he had no idea what was going on.

“Sorry, what?”

There was a distinct note of humor in the set of Hannibal’s brows.  “A task only requires focus if it is challenging, Will.”

Will’s jaw worked fruitlessly for a moment, before he pulled himself together with a heavy blink and a quick lick of his lips.  “I’m beginning to see that.”  Hannibal was always startling; Will had pulled through much worse than this.

That was difficult to remember, though, when he was watching Hannibal step forward, to match his bewildered backward stumble earlier, and telegraph his intent to kiss Will again, and being acutely aware that he had no idea what to do with his hands.

By the time Hannibal’s lips reached his again, he was stiff all over (perplexingly, that included areas where stiffness had been lacking for the past thirty seconds), but the good doctor didn’t seem to mind.  He worked at the nervous tension in Will as patiently as he would have coaxed the fragments of a shattered humerus back into place.  Under the gentle persuasion of Hannibal’s lips and fingers, Will began to relax, and gradually to lean into the contact.

It wasn't until Hannibal began touching him in earnest, though, that Will realized what he was truly in for.

Will supposed that, after spending the better part of a decade without having anyone, any touch should have been intense.  But Hannibal's touch was more than that-- it was maddeningly, impossibly, overwhelmingly good.  Perhaps it was due to his years of expertise in both the mind and the body; perhaps it was that Hannibal simply excelled at this for the same enigmatic reason that he excelled at everything else.  Will refused to entertain the notion that perhaps it was so good for him because  _ Hannibal _ was the one doing the touching.  Not yet.

Regardless, being touched by Hannibal was both electrifying and unusually intimate.  It was like being struck with lightning, and Hannibal dispensed it alternately like a gesture of great esteem, sparing and meaningful, and a token to be distributed generously to one's friends.  Or lovers.  It made Will feel alive.  It made him feel helpless.  It made him  _ feel _ , not with his mind (for once), but with every bit of his body-- every cell, every nerve ending, every electron-- and his brain had difficulty keeping up.

That was normally.  Now, with his hands effectively restrained behind his back, Will had nothing to ground himself with, no way to respond, nothing to sever himself from the immediacy of Hannibal's hands on him except the clench of his fingers around silk.

He began to founder quickly.  Hannibal was  _ everywhere _ , kneading at his pectoral muscles, mouthing at the jut of his collarbone, tracing the length of his spine with thumbs pressed into the firm flesh on either side of it.  His knees threatened to give out when Hannibal’s hands curled under his ass and pressed fingers to the inside of his thighs, and increasingly it became a struggle to keep his legs under him and his hands curled into the fabric.

At least it would provide a distraction from the excess of sensation, Will thought, but that quickly began to fail too; no amount of concentration was able to buffer the percussive intensity of Hannibal expertly manipulating his body with hands and skin and teeth.  He could feel his breathing going hollow, the noises pouring out of his mouth becoming less dignified, more animal in nature as Hannibal stroked over every bit of skin and occasionally pressed deep, short kisses to Will’s open, vulnerable mouth.

It felt like going under, like water working its way into the spaces between his fingers and toes on its way slowly up to smother him.  Will didn’t even know if his eyes had slipped closed or not; he couldn’t see anything, but it was possible that was just due to the brightness blooming behind his eyes every time Hannibal’s hands swept over his skin.

His arms were constantly jerking to move, to touch, to do  _ something _ , but his grip was absolute, almost involuntary by this point. If the scarf wasn't permanently wrinkled by now from the pressure of Will's clenched fingers, it was certainly stained beyond saving by his sweat.

When Hannibal stopped tracing the insides of his elbows and the vee of his hips, and wrapped a hand around his cock, Will spasmed and a guttural cry tore its way out of his throat.  Hannibal sunk his teeth into Will's shoulder, and his rough, low groan took shape more as vibration than as sound.

“Ha…  _ Hannibal _ ,” Will managed.  A warning, a plea, an exclamation,  _ something _ .

“Shhh,” Hannibal murmured absently, licking over the wound he’d left and tilting his head to nose along the underside of Will’s jaw.

Will fought to keep his head above water as Hannibal began to stroke him.  The tide of sensation rose up, threatening to subsume him; Will could feel it lapping against his lower lip, waiting for a chink to appear in his efforts.

Hannibal twisted his hand on the upstroke, rubbing his thumb along the frenulum.

Will drowned.

His mind succumbed to the overwhelming pressure on all sides; the last flimsy barrier keeping the pleasure  _ out  _ fell.  It registered as the sort of shock a swimmer feels when he finds water invading where breath is supposed to be.

Distantly he was aware that he had started to twitch convulsively; echoes of sound suggested themselves to his ears.  But all he could register was how every breath he took dragged in  _ more sensation _ with it.

Hannibal’s voice broke into his catalepsy.

"Hush, Will.  Hush, my dear boy."  Hannibal's hands slid to his jaw and the curve at the base of his skull, holding him there, holding him steady, holding him present.

"Huh... ha... haaa."  Will breathed in large open-mouthed puffs of air; it was the only way he could keep his lungs, and his mind, from collapsing.  Hannibal's hands were large, gripping tight, molding Will in the shape he wanted.  It helped.  The vacuum eased a little.

"Deep breaths, Will.  You can do this for me."  When Will's breathing had deepened sufficiently, Hannibal's thumb rasped across his chin, just shy of his lower lip, and then the hand at his jaw was gone, skimming fingertips down his chest, then his stomach, so Will knew where it was going. 

When Hannibal's hand wrapped lightly around him, Will jerked, and couldn't help but be grateful  for the fingers gripping tightly at his hair, the thumb pressing into the spot behind his earlobe.  A few light strokes, barely there, and Hannibal's hand was letting go, moving to stroke at Will's belly, pressing with the knuckles of his fingers at the spot where the sparse muscles of Will's stomach gave way to the curve of his abdomen.  Will made a hoarse sound that would have been a shout, if he'd had any breath, and Hannibal licked a path up the side of his jaw, whispering quieting noises into the skin.

Hannibal worked him with long steady strokes, and the hand cradling Will’s head came down to tweak a nipple, stroke at his side, thumb over his bottom lip.  Will did his best to shake apart quietly, to quell his instinct to fight the pleasure coursing every synapse of his being.

It built, and built, and built; Will felt like a boat tossed about on a storm, just trying to keep afloat, to remember which way was up.  Hannibal’s hand came up, every now and then, to hold him up in some way or another, steadying him before he could slip away into his own head again.  Then it dipped between his legs, cupping and rolling his testicles in its fingers.  Will let his head fall forward onto Hannibal’s shoulder and tried not to sob.

Suddenly Will realized with his whole body how close he was, how quickly he was rocketing closer.  He tried to breathe through it, but it was no use.  There was too much; pleasure had permeated every fiber, every corner of his mind.  There was nothing left of Will that hadn’t been contaminated.  What would happen when it combusted into orgasm?  Will would be torn apart with it.

Cold panic raced through his veins, pooling in his fingertips and toes.  His lungs forgot how to work again; he started to struggle, to kick, anything to stop his imminent destruction by Hannibal’s hands.

The hands in question quickly flew from what they’d been doing, up to pull Will against Hannibal bodily, stop his desperate thrashing.  Once that had been accomplished, one of them came up to tilt Will’s head back so Hannibal could examine the terrified light in Will’s eyes.  Will was too far gone to tell if the expression that flashed across Hannibal’s face was understanding, or impatience, or interest, but then Hannibal was gathering him close again, rubbing wide circles into his back, making quiet soothing sounds that Will had to steady his breathing to hear.  “That’s it, Will.  Nice deep breaths.  It’s all right.”

Will’s quivering legs finally buckled for a moment before he could catch them; Hannibal caught the sudden weight in his arms with barely a grunt, and guided Will back the few shaky steps to the desk.  He maneuvered Will by the waist, pushing him up to occupy a space somewhere between sitting and leaning against it, taking the weight effectively off his unsteady feet.  Will fairly collapsed in relief.

Hannibal let him rest there, against his chest, for what felt like hours to Will’s befuddled mind; time passed in a daze, marked only by the rise and fall of Hannibal’s roughened breathing, and the slow carding of his fingers through Will’s hair.

“My dear, brave boy.  You’ve been so brave for me, haven’t you?  So good for me.  I need you to be brave just a little longer, Will.  It’ll feel so very good.  Just let go of everything but that scarf, and I’ll make sure of it.”

Hannibal ducked his head to nuzzle at Will’s cheek.  “Can you do that for me, Will?”

Will had no idea if he could-- the tears lurking in the corners of his eyes threatened to return at the very thought-- but he nodded.

Hannibal teethed lightly at the jut of a cheekbone and said, “Good.”

His right hand trailed down the length of Will’s torso, slowly this time, paying thorough attention to the terminal stiffness of Will’s nipple, the contours of his stomach, the jut of his hip.  The left remained where it was, massaging the back of Will’s neck with assertive fingertips.  Fingers wrapped around Will for the third time that night, and the breathless whimper-cry it pulled from him caused Hannibal to push his hips forward into the join of Will’s hip and thigh.

Will would have startled, if he’d had any more energy, at the feel of the erection against his hip.  It had brushed against him when Hannibal had been repositioning him, but Hannibal had seemed to have gone out of his way to keep it from gaining Will’s notice.  Now that it had, Will wanted to touch; but the scarf kept his hands from moving, so he tried to roll his hips forward as best he could.  Hannibal seemed to get the hint, and angled his hips so that they could press together, sending familiar sparks to burst behind Will’s eyelids.  

The soft breath Hannibal made then sounded like surprise and appreciation, but Will didn’t examine it too closely, because Hannibal started moving against him with slow, languid rolls of his hips.  Will arched toward the contact and moaned into the kiss Hannibal pressed to his mouth.  Hannibal set up a rhythm of deep heady kisses and unhurried rocking of the hips, sometimes augmented by a stroke or a press by his hand.  It pulled Will patiently but inexorably toward the edge, accompanied by Hannibal’s soft grunts and occasional groan.

Will tucked the side of his face under Hannibal’s jaw when he approached the final precipice, trying to keep his balance as he teetered at the edge.  Hannibal’s short punctuations of breath lifted the hair at his temple rhythmically, and when teeth scraped over the skin where ear met temple, Will cried out and tumbled into a blinding abyss.  The index knuckle of Hannibal’s hand dragged across Will on its way to seize Hannibal’s own cock; it tore a cry which must have been deafening from Will’s throat and another earth-shaking set of convulsions from his body.

Dimly Will was aware of starting to come back down into his own body, of Hannibal stiffening against him and choking out an indecipherable phrase, but his mind seemed to need a while to piece itself back together, so he let himself slump against Hannibal’s shoulder and focused on just existing.

When Hannibal had caught his breath against Will's sweat-soaked hair, he reached down to take the scarf, but Will's fingers refused to surrender their grip.  The rest of Will was exhausted pliability, but he couldn't seem to make his fingers obey him, even when Hannibal turned his head to murmur "Will?" inquisitively against his ear.

Will caught a few more shivery breaths, and tried to say something that would explain to Hannibal.  He couldn't, but that was okay, because Hannibal seemed to understand; his attention turned back to Will's nearly-cramping hands, and his thumbs started to rub firm soothing circles into the bases of the palms, pressing the hands fractionally more open with each pass.

"Let go, Will," he said, voice low and wrecked, like the underside of a car after four days on gravel roads.  "Just one more thing to let go of for me.  You've done so well.  How could my  imagination hope to match it?  Just let go of it for me now, Will, I know you can do it.  You can do so much, can't you, and you choose to be mine.  There are not words to tell you how honored I am by that.  That's it, now, just like that."

The scarf fluttered onto the desk, and Hannibal's fingers enveloped Will's, working out the tension in them with slow, methodic motions.  Once that was done, the hands moved to the small of Will's back, where he hadn't even known he ached fiercely; Will groaned, muffled, into the crook of Hannibal's neck, and drifted into a kind of intensely languid daze.  He was nearly asleep when Hannibal nudged him, gently, with his chin, asking "Will?" again, with that familiar tone of latent concern.

"Wha'?" Will asked disjointedly, raising his head a fraction and generally making an effort to slip back into consciousness.  "Oh.  Sorry."  He sat up, lifting himself from his heavy, undignified sprawl across Hannibal's chest, and brought his hands up to scrub at his face.  (His elbows complained; he ignored them.)  He ached all over, but it was a bright, clean ache, one that pulsed through his limbs like life and would leave no residue in his bones or his head when it faded.

He looked back up at Hannibal, to find him eyeing Will with an assessing gaze.  "Sorry," Will repeated, with the closest thing to a smile he could manage right then, "I didn't mean to conk out on your shoulder like that." 

Hannibal didn't bother with one of his usual deferrals, but the look he gave Will spoke at least somewhat of amusement.  "I was hoping you would join me downstairs," he said, as though they were having a civil conversation and not naked and covered in come.

"You expect me to dress after  _ that?"  _ Will asked incredulously, and there was a definite upturn to Hannibal's lips now.

"Perhaps not; you're right," Hannibal allowed, and took three steps to the wardrobe, from which he produced a pair of dressing-gowns, offering one to Will.  More silk.

Will opened his mouth to protest ruining the fabric, but Hannibal was already slipping his on and tying it shut, and he was every bit as filthy as Will.  Under Hannibal's expectant gaze, he put on the robe (grey, and exactly as opulent as he had expected) and allowed Hannibal to take him by the hand and lead him down to the kitchen.

There, Will slumped over the counter on a bar stool, watching Hannibal move about and trying valiantly not to fall asleep.  He could have sworn he never let his eyes close, but then Hannibal was saying, "Will," and there was a plate between his elbows of what looked like rice pilaf, beef, and braised vegetables, emanating warmth.  He was peripherally aware of Hannibal naming the foods (almost certainly not with the terms "rice pilaf, beef, and braised vegetables"), but most of what he could focus on was the way the food smelled, and the overpowering emptiness in the pit  of his stomach.

He looked to Hannibal for permission, and received a  _ go ahead  _ nod while Hannibal poured himself a mug of apple cider.  (Looking down, Will saw another mug placed by his left hand.)  Grateful, he dug into the food, eating mostly in silence and occasionally grunting out a compliment that fell utterly short of doing justice to Hannibal's work, but which was met with an appreciative incline of the head all the same.  Hannibal seemed content just to watch Will eat, watching him over the rim of his mug with a warm glint to his eye reminiscent of the way he'd looked at Will upstairs.

When Will had finished his plate, and washed it down with a leisurely swallow of the last of his cider, he decided it was time to address Hannibal’s approving gaze.  “You look awfully pleased with yourself, Doctor Lecter.”

Hannibal collected the dishes from Will’s place with a slight curl of his upper lip that oozed proprietary smugness.  “My ends have all been met.  You’ve had some dinner, and your mind has been freed from the clutches of Jack Crawford.  You were not thinking about an unfortunate family of North Carolinians while you ate; you were enjoying the experience.”

“You wouldn’t rather I were thinking about the events that just transpired in your bedroom?  Or was that simply a means to the end of me enjoying my food?”

Hannibal finished rinsing the dishes with enviable efficiency, and turned back to Will, leaning across the countertop toward him.  “It was a highly satisfying means to the end that you become comfortable enough within your own mind to fully experience what is happening without.  I would rather you enjoy every moment you spend in my presence in its own right.  I have no intention of providing any that are lacking.”  He pitched his voice lower.  “It must also be confessed that I enjoyed a gain in the form of an exquisite addition to my memory palace.  I intend to visit it often.”

Will couldn’t help laughter.  “You want me to appreciate your cooking and your company so that they stand out in my mind against everything else, and I’m less inclined to keep from seeking them out.”

Hannibal’s lips twitched up into a smile, and he withdrew to wipe down the counter with a dishrag.  “It seems my methods have been deciphered.”

Will leaned back on his stool, mirroring Hannibal’s unfettered grin.  “They have, although I don’t anticipate that will make them any less effective.  When you’re done there, I think I’m ready to appreciate falling asleep in your ridiculously squashy Egyptian-cotton zillion-thread-count bed now.”

Hannibal paused in the middle of a wide stroke, and looked up at Will with the most unguarded expression of inconceivable fondness Will had ever witnessed.  Will grinned.

“Scratch that.  I’m ready _now_.  You’re welcome to join me in my appreciation whenever you like.”  And he slid off the stool and headed for the stairs.  

Will counted thirteen seconds before there was a hand planted firmly in the small of his back.


End file.
